Chapter Text
"I still can't wrap my head around letting you choose Aristotle." Nox said, looking at Chase like he'd just thrown up all of over his fancy leather jacket, "Was I high?"
"If that was you being high, then I'd like to see more of it," Chase retorted, leaning back in the uncomfortable library chair and gritting his teeth in order to silence all the less pretty things he'd like to say to Nox and his obnoxious leather jacket. And his stupid leather bag. And those dangly earrings—
He meant it. Nox had gotten confusingly nice the last time they met up in the library and he'd let Chase choose Aristotle even though he'd wanted to go for some random guy that Chase had never heard of. Seriously, what was Nox even on. Maybe he thought choosing someone obscure would make him sound smarter or something. He probably did, considering he only wore designer brands Chase had never heard of before in his life. And he thought that made him cool.
"I doubt you're gonna see it anymore, not with that attitude you won't," Nox huffed, also leaning back like it disgusted him to be 'close' to Chase, even though there was a whole ass table between them, "So don't get your hopes up."
Seriously? What the heck was wrong with this guy?
"Oh, so now I have an attitude? Please," Chase wondered how someone could even be like that. Like, wasn't people like him supposed to be eliminated by evolution a long time ago?
While Chase was thinking this, Nox took a long sip of his matcha.
He supposed that was what happened when you were rich. Nox probably had so much money he'd never had to worry about anything once in his life. Not about his late rent, not about his empty fridge—which for Chase, was gathering dust at this point from how unused it was—and certainly not about his grades. But Chase wasn't letting this go.
"This is forty percent of our grade, buddy," Chase's hands curled into fists under the table, "So you either start actually putting yourself to work or believe me, I will."
Three weeks earlier
Chase listened with horror as the professor went on and on about the group project they were supposed to present by the end of the term. Three months of hard work for forty percent of their grade? This was terrible, and it was his first class of the day too! Just his luck.
And he'd just arrived in this goddamn city—he knew like, uh, nobody here! He knew exactly zero people in this class. How was he supposed to survive this?
He could tell most of the people there had came from the same town… they would surely want to work with each other. What if he got paired with someone who had no interest in working with him and wanted to stick with their own friends?
It wasn't that he didn't like teamwork. He liked it well enough, and he worked well in a team, most of the time, so that wasn't an issue. It was more the fact that he knew nobody from this class—
He took a deep breath. Calm down, he thought, annoyed at his own spiraling, everything's fine. He would probably be paired with someone as awkward and cheerful as himself, and he'd have no problem at all working with them! That was the spirit.
"Excuse me? May I ask a question?" A smug, extremely British voice asked, bringing him out of his thoughts.
All heads turned toward the owner of the voice, and Chase strained his neck, eager to see who'd been brave enough—or perhaps stupid enough—to interrupt the professor. Although this was a room of eighteen-year-old kids fresh out of high school, someone was gonna end up interrupting class.
The boy was… for lack of a better term, really fucking pretty. Like, Chase could tap that kind of pretty, although Chase tried not to use that kind of language, not unless it was a real emergency. And this guy's face screamed emergency.
He had jet black hair, so perfectly smooth and silky that Chase wondered if it was a wig or not, and pale blue eyes that sparkled with wit. His skin was as pale as snow and those cheekbones could cut glass, damnit!
Then Chase spared a glance at the rest of him, and he almost let out a gasp.
He was dressed for the goddamn red carpet! That leather jacket was basically yelling expensive, and his pants—from what Chase could see, looking at his legs under the table—were skinny jeans and clung to his legs like a second skin. His bag was leather too, some kind of artsy over the shoulder thing with a million pockets. He had too many piercings in his ear to count, and gods, that was a particular weakness for Chase.
The professor—He hadn't even bothered to introduce himself before jumping into work—who had been in the middle of explaining what the project was all about, blinked twice, and kind of looked around, confused—like asking, did y'all just see that?—before saying,
"You just did." He scratched at the back of his head, "But go on."
"This group project—we'll have to work with someone? Like a person?"
Chase already hates him.
What sort of stupid question is that? Of course they'll have to work with another person, it's a two person project for fucks sake! How stupid is this guy? Or does he just like attention that much? Really, this all just proves that one person can't have beauty and wits, or at least not at the same time.
"Yes… Weren't you listening when I was explaining how I am going to pair you all up by the end of the lesson? Were you paying any attention at all?"
"No." The boy said. Just like that.
The professor looked like he wanted to chop his head off. Chase tried really hard to muffle his laughter, and saw that a couple other people were also struggling with the same thing.
"If you're done disrupting my class," The man said through gritted teeth, "I would like to start announcing the pairings, if that's alright with you, of course."
"It's fine, I suppose," The boy shrugged, and now everyone was laughing and Chase was biting his hand in fear of what the professor would say if he were to join in.
The man didn't dignify that with a response. He begun listing the people who would be paired with each other—and Chase was asleep for the whole five minutes it took, because really, he knew nobody so the names made no sense to him.
But the professor reached his name at last, and of course, he had no idea who the hell he'd been paired up with. He spent exactly five seconds in ignorance before the person decided they had an objection to make.
"I'm being paired with him?" the boy with the pale blue eyes spoke up, and Chase's head whipped back to stare at him at the implied insult, "I think there's been a mistake, really—"
"Now that's not a very nice thing to say," One of the girls said under her breath, but it meant nothing to the boy, of course.
"I don't think there's been any mistakes, Mr. Libris," The professor said smugly, "If you're unhappy with your teammate you can remind yourself that this is forty percent of your grade."
Everyone giggled under their breath. But Chase's head was reeling. Libris? He hadn't been paying attention at attendance but wasn't Libris the name of that pretentious ass art gallery? The same one that he always dreamed of submitting to and being a part of? And this boy…
Was apparently the son of the owner.
There was no other way. He resembled the man clearly, and from the state of his clothes…
Chase sighed.
This was going to be a long, long year.
And he had an early shift tomorrow.